KALAMAZOO -- Out of shoulder pads, his tall, gangly build leaves no impression of a Division I football player.

Lined up as a wide receiver at a Western Michigan University football practice, though, Eric Monette plays the role unexpectedly well.

"Monette's got a chance," Broncos head coach Bill Cubit said of the Portage Central High School graduate's college football outlook. "He's a big, tall, lanky kid. Not great speed, but good-enough speed. Pretty good ball skills. Get him in the weight room ... "

Monette and former Mustangs teammate E.J. Riley have both gone from nondescript high school receivers to preferred walk-ons at WMU to early surprises in fall camp -- especially Monette, who at 6-foot-5 and 180 pounds is the tallest of WMU's receivers by two inches.

Though it's doubtful either will see game action this season -- there are at least eight receivers ahead of them on the depth chart -- both have played as high as the second-team offense in practice.

"I didn't expect (any reps in practice), but I just saw it as they're giving me an opportunity, so I'm going to try to take the opportunity to the best of my abilities and do what I can," said E.J. Riley, listed at 6-0 and 180 pounds, who played in a run-first offense in high school.

"My friend came here as a preferred," Riley continued, about redshirt-freshman walk-on running back Jaron DeShazor, a fellow P-Central alum. "He works really hard and he's still on the team. So obviously if we work as hard as him and we get help from our teammates, there's no telling where we could be in the next few years."

Riley committed to the Broncos in the spring, knowing he wanted to play D-I football and stay close to home.

Monette, on the other hand, wasn't even certain he was going to join the program until shortly before they handed out the helmets.

"I just got an e-mail that said 'I want to come,'" Cubit said of Monette. "We had known about him, tried to get him here, but we didn't know he was going to show up until about a week before."

Gazette fileFormer Mendon star Joe Smith, right, is the only walk-on who has a realistic chance of playing this year. Smith, who reminds the Western Michigan coaches of ex-walk-on and current starting middle linebacker Dustin Duclo, could fill in on special teams if needed.

"I was just keeping my options open," said Monette, who'd like to put on 20 pounds of muscle. "I was pretty sure I wanted to go here. I was planning on it like the last month, month-and-a-half.

"I'm still trying to learn all the plays. I only have so many of them down right now."
Monette and Riley are two of five freshman preferred walk-ons at WMU from the Kalamazoo area.

Smith, the state's Division 7-8 player of the year in 2007, is the only one with a chance to play this season, because of the linebacker's noticeable toughness and value on special teams, and the program's desire to redshirt its scholarship freshmen rather than have them fill in for a special teams injury.

"It's nice when (the walk-ons) are local kids, because they don't have as many issues with home sickness," Cubit said. "And the other thing is they bring a little something to the program.

"I think once they get into the program, the weight program and (the only sport) they do is play football, they'll get themselves better. Those guys, if they just stay with it, sometimes they end up playing."

Three players in WMU's preseason defensive two-deep are former walk-ons.

Cubit's confidence in his program's most unheralded players -- specifically pointing out the P-Central duo and Smith -- is a boost for rookies like Riley and Monette, who have a such a long way to climb.

"There's always that thing in the back of your mind that says, 'You've got to keep going, you've got to keep pushing yourself,' and then just to hear him say that, that really helps a lot," Riley said. "That makes you want to stay here and makes you want to do the things that you're supposed to do and eventually to be able to play."

Just being a part of their hometown Division I program, for now, is plenty.

"It has a special meaning," Riley said. "Your neighbors and other people, when you tell them that you're going to Western to play football, they're like, 'Oh, great, I'm going to come see you.' That makes it more family-oriented right there.

"Everybody's going to come to the game, and say, 'Oh, that's the Riley kid. Oh, that's the Monette kid that we saw playing at Portage Central High School.'"